


In the Aftermath

by Lynx357



Category: Supernatural
Genre: A few others - Freeform, Dean Has Issues, Donna is a sweetheart, Gen, IDGAF, Oops, Post Season 13, Pre season 14, Pre-Slash, but he’s getting better, deans pov, guess from who, jack and claire are siblings, people don’t come here for the truth, sams pov, self indulgent, they come for good news, this was meant to be happier, with help
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-03
Updated: 2018-09-03
Packaged: 2019-07-06 15:21:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,491
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15888726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lynx357/pseuds/Lynx357
Summary: Sam still can’t quite believe that it’s over. His muscles are shaking and everyone around him still looks shell-shocked and exhausted. Half of them are just getting used to being alive again. But all in all there is a feeling of triumph in the air, in the way they all look at each other and breathe together and wait.Away from their little group, Dean still stands, tense and still and silent.





	In the Aftermath

Sam still couldn’t quite believe that it was over. His muscles were shaking with leftover adrenaline, and everyone around him looked shell-shocked and exhausted. Every heartbeat, both his and everyone else’s felt like a miracle. There was a feeling of triumph in the air, in the way they all looked at each other and breathed together and waited.

Everyone was covered in blood and dirt, clothes torn and grimy. Even Gabriel and Rowena, for all their power, looked disheveled, too tired to straighten out their appearance like they normally would. The high-maintenance pair had still each snapped themselves up a chair rather than slump in the ground like all the others. To the entertainment of the group, Rowena had made a sly comment about her chair being better quality, which then somehow led to a wholly ridiculous contest between the witch and the archangel in which they both began producing abominably gaudy thrones with ever more outlandish decorations in an attempt to outdo each other. 

This had finally culminated in Mary slapping both of them upside the head and threatening to make Jack dump them both on the floor if they didn’t cut it out. Sam watched them with an amused and mildly rueful smile - this was just the last in a long line of increasingly infantile attempts to one-up each other in the powers department. Gabriel was still sore from the failed portal of the year before, for all he denied it. These days dead set on proving he he was back to full strength - hence the unnecessary display of power. Rowena, however, was the reigning champion of these competitions; it seemed that what she lacked in power she more than made up for in imagination and trickery. 

Jack was the main reason that they were all still breathing; in the hectic chase after Michael and Dean those last few months, every single one of them had died or been injured. Gabriel had been pulled out of the Empty before the hunt for Michael had even properly begun (the first of the angels to be resurrected by Jack, followed later by a dozen more). Several bets had been placed on him being murdered yet again for playing one too many pranks on the more violent of the bunkers inhabitants. (His excuse was that to much work and no play would be detrimental to their health - Mary suggested that at least it was better than trickster-induced heart attacks, but, sadly, she had been ignored). The first of these incidents had been with Sam, when the archangel had decided to announce his return from the Empty by materializing in the shower just as Sam was entering it, with a shit-eating grin and holding a video camera. (For the sake of his sanity, Sam did his best not to think about where exactly that footage had ended up.) Maybe when Dean was back on his feet, he could help Sam come up with some appropriate revenge. 

Needless to say, Jack had become very good at using his powers for healing out of necessity, and it often took a lot out of him; when asked, he would simply say that he was glad to be using his powers to fix something, rather than to destroy. Sam had praised him for it, and he had been so thrilled that he had quite literally floated around the bunker for about a day and a half, causing Maggie to shriek and hit him in the face with a book when she was interrupted in the library by a bright “Hello!”. This had been one of the very few fond memories made during the last few months. Jack’s grace recovery hadn’t been instant; it had been weeks before he felt anything but human. But with how much practice he had gotten, however awful it was that they needed it at all, his self-confidence had grown in leaps and bounds. 

At that moment , Jack was blinking sleepily with his head resting on Claire’s shoulder. The two of them made an unlikely pair - her all biting sarcasm and spiky personality and him with his endless optimism and enthusiasm. When they first met, Jack had managed a remarkable resemblance to a baby duck; following Claire around with an awestruck expression, and, once he had gathered up the courage to speak actual words to her, theorizing in that odd, sincere way of his that since Castiel was both sort of his father and sort of her father that they were basically brother and sister.

Claire had met this proclamation with skeptically raised eyebrows and a heavily sarcastic, although,for her, rather indulgent,  
“Sure, bro.” Jack, being Jack, had taken this (supposed) confirmation with a beaming smile, and continued to idolize Claire, until she found her general irritation softening into heavily disguised fondness for his antics. Apparently, even she wasn’t immune to his unique brand of charm. In the quiet after the battle, they sat together against one of the trees not reduced to a smouldering stump, arms around each others shoulders, struggling to stay awake.

Jody and Donna were there too of course, although the rest of the Sioux Falls gang had stayed behind at the bunker with Bobby and the newly resurrected angels who had not decided to return to heaven. They were intended as the backup for when the mission almost inevitably went to hell in a Winchester patented hand basket.

Jody was hovering near to her daughter, flinching every time she caught sight of the blood still staining her hair, while Donna had started cheerfully handing around mugs of soup that she had brought in the largest thermos that Sam had seen in his life. Every so often, Donna would glance over at Cas or Rowena, who were staring down at the eye-wateringly fluorescent cups in their hands, and break into quiet giggles at the bewildered(Cas) and disgusted(Rowena) looks on their faces.

However, away from their little group, Dean stood, tense and still and silent. Sam frowned a little; he knew the feeling of abruptly being yourself again, of walking away from being worn almost to shreds by something huge and bright and burning, and everything afterwards feeling unreal and lopsided, like being drunk and alone at five in the morning, the world left strange and liquid.

He’d hugged Dean, of course. As soon as his brother had gasped his first free breath, they’d yanked each other close and choked out each other’s names, and reveled in the safety that they had only ever known with each other. But then everyone else had wanted hugs and Jack and Cas and Gabriel had needed to fix the lesser injuries that had been passed over earlier in favour of Claire’s broken neck and Mary’s gaping chest and Dean’s burnt out, shattered shell. 

But now, gathered around the impala and Jody’s cruiser, Dean had separated from their little rag tag group. Exhaling softly in resignation and concern, Sam shifted, palm digging into the dry, gritty earth, abused muscles creaking in protest at the idea of moving.

“I’ll go.” Sam started a little, tilting his head back to look up at Cas where he was leaning against the driver side door, staring off towards Dean. Cas glanced down at Sam and straightened up as he watched. 

“You’re tired and hurting. I will go and talk to your brother.” His voice was even, but Sam could hear the edge underneath the words. The one that was both defensive and questioning, as though Cas both didn’t want to overstep his boundaries and yet was prepared to go through the whole brutal fight all over again just to make sure that he got to speak to Dean.

Sam smiled warmly at the angel.  
“Sure, Cas. Go for it. God knows the two of us have worn the ‘are you okay after traumatic events’ talk to death. Maybe it’ll work better coming from someone new.” Cas pulled a bit of a face at that, as though to say he very much doubted it. But then he nodded, and, after a slight hesitation, strode purposefully away from the car. Sam’s smile turned a little knowing as he watched him go, but he turned his head to give them some privacy. Exasperatedly, he then rolled his eyes at Gabriel and Rowena whose competition had apparently graduated into seeing who could create the best dragon illusion.

 

It was a beautiful evening, Dean noted absently. The sun was hidden behind engorged thunderheads congealing on the horizon, the clear sky above his head purpleing like a fresh bruise, freewheeling birds silhouetted against the dying light. He could hear his family behind him, murmuring softly to each other. Part of his brain whispered that he should join them.

Michael had given him dreams like this though. Distraction or punishments or twisted entertainment when he got too loud or too annoying or too quiet. Although they had never felt this real, he still couldn’t quite trust it. Story of his fucking life, right? The corner of his mouth twitched in a parody of amusement; the first movement he had made in almost fifteen minutes. There was still a voice in his head, hissing that none of this was real, that he was deluding himself, that he should "Try to move, go on. Move, fight, scream! You know how much I like to watch you fail." 

It didn’t even hurt any more, which almost worried him. How fucked up was he, that even his worst nightmares couldn’t break through the numbness? In a way, though, Dean was grateful. Numbness was better than pain. He’d had enough of that for a thousand lifetimes.

Distantly, Dean registered footsteps approaching. Probably Sam - after all, how many times had they danced this fucking dance? Sam would come up to him, hover for about a minute and then would either try to make him talk about feelings or some shit, or would try and distract him somehow, as if that was possible anymore. It came as a surprise then, when the person standing next to him reached out silently, and gently took his hand. 

If he could have, Dean would have jumped. As it was, the shock of it freed him enough to slowly turn his head and meet Cas’ eyes. When he’d first woken up as himself, the first thing that he’d noticed about his best friend was how goddamn tired he had looked. Not physically, no, angelic boosts from both Jack and Gabriel had had Cas stronger than he'd been in years; even his wings had been restored. But the lines of his face and the set of his shoulders had told Dean everything he needed to know about the emotional toll his disappearance had taken. 

It still seemed ridiculous to Dean, that this being, this millennia old force of nature who had seen him broken and twisted and shattered, who had betrayed and been betrayed by him, who had sacrificed everything he had ever known, who had been broken just as much and reduced to something so much less than what he should be, all because of an insignificant, useless human, could still be so grieved by his loss that it took a physical toll.

Yet, as the angel stepped around to stand in front of Dean, his borrowed face naked with emotion, so far from the blankness of his early days on Earth, it was the first thing that truly felt real. For all of his prying, Michael had never managed to find out about this. Probably because Dean had never really taken the time to figure it out. Had never allowed himself to, at any rate. 

Cas looked both worried and hopeful, terrified and impossibly determined. His face said “I’m here”. It said “whatever you need”. It said “let me help you". Crazily, after years of cut off moments and unnamed feelings, Dean felt like maybe, finally, he could accept. They had been to hell and heaven and purgatory. They had fought off gods and monsters and even their own Goddamn families, and fuck it, right there, right then, they could be brave.

For a moment, all that Dean could do was stare blankly, still too numb in mind and body to do anything else, but his hand, where Cas was touching it - the smallest brush of fingers on palm - found itself gripping back. And Cas, who for all he had learned from them, was still awkward and stiff and bad at reading people, shifted just a tiny bit closer and oh-so-softly squeezed Deans fingers.

Unthinkingly, Dean swallowed. He swallowed, and his shoulders relaxed, just a little, and he nodded. He nodded, and kept nodding, as though he couldn’t stop, and Cas’ mouth ticked up by a millimeter in gentle amusement that was almost hidden by relief. Then, suddenly bold, he gave Deans hand a little tug. That was all it took for Dean to all but collapse against him. 

It wasn’t particularly graceful; he essentially face planted Cas’ collarbone. His nose was crushed sideways; the weird canvas material of the trench coat was rough and the buttons dug uncomfortably into the side of Deans chest. The fabric itself still smelled of blood and gasoline and he was clutching at Cas’ hand so tightly that, had he been human, his fingers would have probably been in splinters. 

Dean didn’t sob or scream. He still wasn’t capable of that, not yet, not really. All he could really do was gasp into Cas’ shoulder and bring his other hand up to grip shakily at his back, tendons spasming minutely as though being electrocuted. His lungs were working overtime to make up for the months of running on nothing but grace, his arms wound crushingly around his best friend, his brain emptying for the first time in forever, because the endless struggle for his own body was finally, finally over. 

Cas kept pressing his face against Deans head, almost rubbing, like a cat. It was odd, but sweet, and later, Dean might gently tease him for it. He smoothed his free hand over Deans back, murmuring soft reassurances that Dean hardly payed attention to, focusing instead on the voice that was saying them. It could have been in English or Enochian, or something else altogether. He didn’t really care. Being able to hear the rumble of Cas’ voice in his ear was enough.

Time slipped by as they stood there together, almost shyly, as if it didn’t want to disturb them. Eventually, though, Dean released Cas, and pushed himself away from him, just a little, and smiled. Not widely, or even really happily, but it was mirrored back at him, like an agreement. Like a promise. Behind them, car doors echoed as they slammed shut, good-natured bickering fading in and out as everyone argued over seats. Dean turned around to walk back to his family.

And at his side, hand firmly clasped in his, walked Cas.

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first ever fic, and its so self indulgent i almost feel bad. The only thing I didn't include was a Destiel kiss - it just didn't feel right with the narrative. But I had this idea of Cas feeling brave and reaching out, and Dean just accepting it, because, why not? I tried to get the depth of feeling across in a way that felt in character, but still went with the tone of the story - you'll have to let me know if I succeeded. Thanks for reading!


End file.
